


All the Evidence  (clean)

by FixOrRideDaily



Series: Until Proven Guilty [9]
Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: Engaged Couple, F/M, Menstruation, Plans For The Future, Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-01
Updated: 2017-04-01
Packaged: 2018-10-13 18:20:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10519236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FixOrRideDaily/pseuds/FixOrRideDaily
Summary: All of the evidence points to two things: She's pregnant and there's no way he'll take well.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Clean version of my story with the same name.

Ashley stared at the plastic stick of technology in her hand. The fifth one she used at this point because even sober and in everyday life she was anxious and paranoid. It flashed a little plus sign up at her just like the last four had done before it. She dropped it onto the floor with the others and sat down next to the pile of trash she'd made out of tests and boxes. She contemplated using the sixth one as well, they came two to a box after all, and she bought three boxes from three different companies for safety, but decided she probably didn't have enough pee left in her for that. She had had problems with her menstrual cycle ever since it started. It had always been very irregular. That's why she was put on birth control at a young age. It helped things even out a little, but it still wasn't uncommon for her to skip her period for a month or even more rarely two whole months in a row. Three though, that had never happened before. It's what had compelled her to check and make sure. And now she was sure.

One positive she could probably write off as a mistake, but five?

Her first question was when had it happened? During her first few weeks of student teaching? That was more than likely. Life had become a confusing messy haze then. She hated high school students (she wanted to teach middle school age kids, but she was required to do quarter of a school year teaching both for her degree), especially those arrogant boys that thought they were above it all because they could throw a ball, or got laid a lot. Between that, her wedding planning, and all the calls with the small publishing house she was talking to about printing her novella on what happened on Blackwood Pines it wasn't a stretch to imagine she had forgotten to take her birth control a couple times.

Oh, her book. Yes, that was the night. Definitely.

\---

She had had such an awful day. It was Friday and some boys in her last class had some game coming up and why couldn't all high school jocks be like Matt was? They were rowdy and loud all through her lesson and the rest of the class were on their phones under their desks. No one had turned in their homework so she didn't even bother assigning any for the weekend. She wouldn't have let her father talk her into teaching as a back-up career choice to author if she had known she would be terrible at it.

She stripped down to just her underwear and pulled on one of Chris' old gaming t-shirts moments after walking through their bedroom door. He always said he hated when she did that, complaining it was the reason he had to do laundry twice as often as she did and not the fact that he wore multiple layers all the time, but she knew he liked the way she looked in his clothes. She flopped herself down on their bed and was ready to sleep until Monday when she heard the apartment door open and Chris enter.

“Yo, Strawberry Shawty,” he called out, “You home, yet?” She rolled her eyes, but she giggled a little. He had called her that for whatever reason the first time they had sex and whether he thought it was cute or funny or possibly even sexy the nickname had stuck. She thought it was meant to be some kind of an alternative take on the moniker strawberry shortcake, but she wasn't entirely sure.

“Ugh!” she moaned out lamely. He didn't hear her because when he wandered in to their bedroom where she was he called out her name.

“I'm dead,” she answered dropping a pillow over her face, “I have died unless there is an emergency.”

“Long day?” he asked and she heard him place something heavy next to the bed before she felt the bed sink as his weight was added to it.

“The longest,” she said throwing the pillow away from her and sighing, “Were high school boys this awful when we were that age? I don't remember them being this awful.”

“We did go to a private, reputable, honors high school that students had to pass tests to attend and then our parents either had to pay a ton of money or hope we earned good scholarships to keep attending,” he reminded her, “You on the other hand, Ash, teach in a public high school.”

“Point made,” she mumbled.

“Hey,” Chris said bounding down at the end of the bed and shaking her knee a few times, “I think I got something that's gonna blow your mind right out of your pretty little head with happiness.”

“What?” Ashley groaned out cynically.

“Well, you got a big heavy package from Eldritch publishing house in the mail today,” Chris teased barely hiding his own excitement. She sat up straight when he said that suddenly full of energy. She smiled brightly down at where he was grinning at her from next to her legs. She sprang forward to the other side of the bed to find the box she heard him drop there earlier with a shriek of glee.

“No way,” she yelled in joy. 

“Yes way,” he said as she pulled at the tape, it had already been messed with and she guessed Chris had checked to make sure the box contained what he thought it did before telling her about it. She felt him slide up behind her as she ripped off the box's packaging and opened it. There, piled up, were multiple copies of Ashley's newly published novella; The Betrayal on Blackwood Pines.

She pulled the top most one out and admired it. The cover had the dark night sky with a waning moon, a snowy mountain top and eight silhouetted figures standing there in terror. If you looked closer you could see that the whole thing was actually the face of a monster. The monster that still haunted her dreams sometimes to this very day. She ran her hand over the silver title and then over the dark blue author's name. (Her name!) She hugged the book to herself tightly.

“Oh Chris, look at them, can you believe it?” she said holding the book up to her face and breathing in deeply before pushing it into his face instead, "Oh smell it Chris, it has that new book smell."

“I'll take your word on that,” he laughed and took the book from her hands to admire the cover himself. She dove back down into the box and started counting how many copies there were.

“Look there's enough here for everyone to have one. You can have your own copy. And one for Nat and one for dad. One for your mom and anyone else in your family who wants one. There's enough for all the guys too, Sam and Jess and Matt. Do you think Emily and Mike will want copies?” She was talking very fast now as she fell back with another copy in her hands and started flipping through it. Her words were in print. She was a published author. It was everything she had ever dreamed.

“Huh,” Chris said his focus still on the cover of the book in his hands.

“What's up?” Ashley asked sitting up again, worried that he had found something wrong with her book. Gaiman’s rule after all. Chris gave her a smirk.

“Ash Hartley?” he asked wiggling his eyebrows at her.

“Oh,” she wondered if she was blushing as she played with her engagement ring, “Yeah, I know we aren't married yet, but I submitted 'Ash Hartley' as my pen name since it will be my name soonish. My editor thought 'Ash' would sell better for a horror novella since it sounds like a more gender neutral name and I picked 'Hartley' cause I liked how it sounded better. You aren't upset with me are you?

“Nope,” he said dropping her book back into the box and crawling up towards her, “I was just thinking about how much I love the way that sounds, actually.”

“Chris,” she knew she was blushing when he started planting kisses along her neck and jawline.

“You know, I've always wanted to go to bed with a published author,” Chris said against her ear.

“Liar,” she said pushing him to his side of the bed playfully.

“Okay, you called my bluff,” he admitted, “I really do now though.”

“And I really want to read you part of my novella,” she said, straddling him. He raised an eyebrow.

“And you expect me to be able to pay attention with you sitting on me like this in your underwear?”

“Chris,” she scolded in good nature.

“Kidding,” he reassured, “I wanna hear what you wrote. Really I do. Read it to me. Please.”

Maybe it was fate that she happened to flip to Chapter 11. The part where Emily came crashing through the door screaming about a monster. The part where the stranger appeared and told them all about the Wendigos for the first time. The part where they learned their lives were still very much in peril and that Mike had left Josh alone in the shed. Ashley read her own words with passion:

“'No matter what we can't just let him die,' Chris said.

'Then I'll go with you,' The stranger proclaimed, 'going alone would be suicide. The rest of you get down into the basement and don't leave again until we're back.'

Even after everything that had happened that night Chris was going for Josh. Whether out of guilt or loyalty or what have you, he was going. None of them understood it, but then none of them had known the young man the way Chris did and when Chris set his mind to a task it usually got done. Though with so many of their friends already lost in the cold black darkness of the night and the wind screeching like the ghost of long lost almost forgotten lover nobody wanted to let him leave. Nobody wanted to lose him. Least of all Ashley. She followed his heavy stomping footfalls towards the door feeling like each was another gunshot to her already bleeding fragile heart. She wanted to tell him not to go, to beg him to stay behind, to stay there safely with her, but she knew that if he didn't go for their friend he wouldn't be Chris. That was his nature and she loved him for it. She had realized it so late and she didn't care what he said she wasn't going to let another moment of their time together go to waste.

'Come back safe,' she told him before giving him a chaste kiss on the lips and hoping as she locked the door behind him and he made his way behind the man with experience she trusted to bring him back to her that she would get a least a thousand more chances to do it again.” 

Ashley looked down at Chris feeling tears in her eyes as she finished the chapter and closed her book. She may have exaggerated a little for dramatic effect as an author, but there was so much truth to what she had written there. That had been their first kiss and Ashley knew then that she already loved Chris.

“Well,” Chris tried to tease through his own tears, “What happened next? Did he make it back to her?”

“Guess you'll have to read it to find out,” she said with a demure smile.

“That's okay,” he said rolling them over so he was pinning her to the bed and kissing her face, “I've got a good feeling about the two of them.”

“Hey!” she giggled as he pulled her novella from her hands and placed it on the nightstand. He began to kiss her neck and pushed up the large t-shirt she was wearing. She let him pull it off of her and then she was laying there underneath him in just her panties and god did she love the way Chris looked at her when he wanted her. Like… like...

“Oh shit Ash,” Chris sighed, “There is no way that you are real.” Yeah, like that. Then his mouth was on her neck again. She alternated between giggles and sighs while he bit gently on her skin. Then suddenly Chris pulled back and looked serious.

“I think what you wrote about me in your book was beautiful,” he said, “And I really really love you.”

“Chris...” she stopped and looked away from his intense gaze. He didn't usually get like this. Chris was not an overly romantic guy.

Oh he told her that he loved her all the time, but in goofy silly ways like texting her ugly heart and kiss and other cutesy emoticons, or saying things like 'Yeah, anything for my favorite girl' or calling her dumb nicknames like “Strawberry Shawty” or “Spotted Hottie” or “Cute Little Green-eyed Monster,” or giving her silly little gifts that didn't quite say it but came kinda close which was nice, or saying it in a stupid baby talk voice before blowing a wet raspberry into her neck. Don Juan, her fiance was not.

“I love you too, Chris and I want you so bad.” Because Ashley wasn't sure what else there was to say.

He laughed loud and honest at that, “Seriously, you can't be real. I gotta wake up some day. I know it.”

“Shut the hell up and make love to me.” 

\---

Ashley felt like it had to have been that night. Or maybe she was just being overly sentimental and wanted it to be that night. It could just as easily have been their quicky in the shower the very next week or the time weeks after that when she finally convinced him to have sex with her on the kitchen table only for her father to ring the doorbell while Chris was mid-climax and she hadn't even come yet. The two of them had to sit awkwardly through lunch with him at that same table afterward too.

She looked down at her newly collected pile of trash and supposed it really wasn't a concern what the circumstances exactly were because no matter what they were the point was that it had happened. She was... they were... well this was happening. This was something she had to deal with in the present. That meant she had to tell Chris.

See that was the kicker here. 

She and Chris had been together for maybe three or four years and had known each other about ten. She knew him and she knew him well. Chris was in the simplest of terms, a planer. He wasn't an obsessive planner or anything like that, but he had a good idea of how he wanted his life to go since he was in middle school. His life was going right on schedule in fact. He had graduated High School with the highest honors, Chris had been their class' valedictorian and Emily had been their salutatorian. Ashley graduated third in class but there was no special name for that. Both she and Chris had attended college at the University of Southern California and once again both of them had graduated Summa Cum Laude. He was offered a job at a small startup company less than five weeks after that. It was pretty good money even if it wasn't great hours (he worked up to ten hours a day sometimes and still brought work home with him) but he was doing what he loved to do; coding and designing software.

One year before graduation he had proposed to Ashley (with his grandmother's one-of-a-kind ruby and silver engagement ring that had been in his family for five generation already if you counted Chris' mother and uncle but neither of them had used it and OH MY GOD). He had told her that he couldn't imagine his future without her in it. She had absolutely enthusiacally agreed. They were already living together, had moved in together their second year of college, so they started saving for a wedding.

They had of course talked about a futrue together beforehand.

\---

The first time it seriously came up was when Ashley was in a childhood development class that she had to take as part of her teaching degree. She had to raise a virtual child on some online program as part of her class to see the effects different actions had on it. The program wasn't super advanced or anything, but it did ask for basic genetic features of two parents to create a “child” and then you got to name your “child” so you would feel more attached to it. She had of course put in her information and then Chris' because he was her boyfriend and when lost for what name to give it when it turned out to be a blond haired, green eyed boy she just named it after Chris for simpcity's sake. Done and done.

She had left her laptop open on the bed when she went to take a shower that night. She did that a lot. She would usually get overwhelmed doing her schoolwork and would stop in the middle to shower or eat or play video games on the hightech desktop hooked up to the 50 inch flatscreen and surround sound system they kept set up in their bedroom for that purpose only (it was their first purchase as a couple not counting the double bed because they needed that). She came out of the bathroom in his Pajamas (maybe she did where his clothes too much) to find Chris on the bed checking out her laptop with interest. That surprised her. Chris had a much nicer laptop than her clunky old thing. He often pleaded with her to let him get her a newer one. But there was nothing wrong with hers so she refused.

“What are you looking at?” she asked sitting next to him.

“What program is this?” he asked in response. He did that often. Answer her questions with questions. Ah that was it. He was intriqued by the program on it. He probably hadn't seen something like it before and was curious about it.

“It's some virtual baby-to-early teen child raising program that I have to use for my psycology of childhood development class,” she answered leaning over to show him.

“How's it work?”

“Oh well, you tell it some basic traits about two people and it makes you a kid or it can give you a randomly generated kid and it shows you this like animated picture of it over here,” she said showing him, “and then it tells you what it wants to do and what it likes and you choose stuff to do with it and things for it to do when it's on it's own. Like clubs, and activities and schoolwork and stuff and it tells you how it will respond psycologically. It has these meters over here that track things like energy and hapiness and social and athletism and discipline and things like that. I have to do stuff with it and for it and then show my teacher the record of how it responded and also write on why I chose those things and why I think it responded the way it did and what I can do differently. That sort of thing.”

“It's fucking ugly and slow as hell, though that might be your dinosaur of a laptop,” Chris said to her.

“I'll let my teacher know what you think of it. Thanks,” Ashley responded pushing him aside so she could continue working. She had to spend an hour a day with her “son.”

“So,” Chris said over her shoulder, “That's your cyber kid then?”

“Mmmhmm,” she answered as she signed him up for piano lessons. He didn't want to learn an instrument, but she thought it would be good for his discipline, which he lacked.

“And you named him Chris?” he asked a little awkwardly.

“Yeah, I couldn't think of anything else,” she said as she tracked that her “kid's” discipline did go up.

“You get a randomly generated one then?” he asked. She felt his eyes on her, watching for a reaction.

“Huh. No, I put in the genes of two parents and this is how it turned out.” Her “kid's” happiness went down and his social was being affected by it. She figured she'd send him to boy scouts becuase all the sports options seemed to be a little agressive and she didn't want an angry “kid.”

“He's blonde,” Chris responded, she got the feeling he was trying to say something important to her that she was missing. She was distracted by her work though.

“Must get that from you.” She said off- handly. He liked boy scouts. His social and his happiness were going up. She hoped he had the energy for all this activity.

“So you used my basic traits and your basic traits to make a virtual version of a potential child of yours. And then you chose to name this child after me?” Something about the way he said it got her attention. She stopped what she was doing to look over at him. He looked like he wanted to ask her something.

“Yeah,” she answred slowly, “You're not reading anything into that are you?”

“Well, it's kinda hard not to,” he said with a shrug, “Is there nothing to read into?”

“Chris,” Ashley forgot all about her homework in that moment, “What are you asking me right now?”

“I guess I'm asking you if you've,” he breathed out a little heaviver than normal, “ever thought about it? You know like you and me? Marriage? ...Kids?”

“Oh,” she said feeling nervous, “I mean yeah. I've thought about it. Have you?”

“Yeah, I have.”

They both got awkwardly quiet for awhile.

“So, what do you see?” Ashley asked him arms crossed and not looking at him. She felt herself blush.

“Huh?”

“When you think about it?” she clarified, “How do you see us? Married and with, you know, kids?”

“Oh,” Chris said, “Um well I don't see it happening for a while, but I... I do see it happening. The kids thing I mean. I think we could get married not too long after we graduate. Then I think we should start saving for a house. Maybe somewhere out by the desert cause I bet you'd like that and I don't mind having to drive far to work. Once we were secure finicailly cause I had a good job at a hopefully sucessful company and you had published three or so books or were teaching at a good school maybe with tenure and we could make sound investments into their futures then we can do the kids thing.”

Ashley smiled widely at how much thought he'd put into this. She probably shouldn't find the methodical side of Chris as appealing as she did. She crawled a little closer to him.

“Yeah?” she said, “And uh how many are we talking here?”

“We could have as many or as few as you want to,” he answered with a shrug, “But I was thinking probably like three or four. Maybe even five.”

“Four or Five?” Ashley said playfully hugging him around his neck, “Aren't you ambitious?”

“I didn't really have siblings when I was growing up,” he said returning her hug, but his ears were red, “Brian was already fifteen when our parents got married and he barely treated me like I was his brother anyway and I was already eleven when Nick was born so he was little for most of my life. I think it would be nice to have a house full of kids for a change.”

“I think that would be nice too,” she agreed and found herself kissing him. Her mom had died when she was a little girl (only four) and it had just been her, her sister and her father ever since. Her dad was also a very strict man so her house had always been quiet. She'd love to have the opposite as an adult.

“I have to stop neglecting my virtual child,” she groaned when she pulled away.

“That's okay,” he said kissing her nose, “I have to do my Stat homework anyway. Go be a good mom.”

\---

It came up again once or twice after that, but from then on it was pretty much decided. Ashley was happy Chris had laid it out so perfectly for them because it meant there was no confusion and that was always good for her anxiety. Marriage, careers, house, finicial security, kids. That was the plan.

Chris didn't react well to things not going according to plan.

“Hey, Ash?” she heard from outside the bathroom door. Well, speak of the devil and he shall appear.

“Yeah?” she called back.

“You feeling alright? You've been in there since I left to go get dinner.” God, why did he have to be the sweetest guy on the face of the earth? That was just going to make telling him even harder.

“Just a little sick, you didn't get anything super greesy did you?”

“Beats me, how greesy is chinese food?”

She sighed. Sometimes she forgot simple concepts like 'how much fat is in this food,' or 'what do you mean you have to wash both sides of the plates?' elluded her “genius” husband-to-be.

“Nevermind, I'm coming out,” she said pulling herself up and opening the door. She probably should have cleaned up her mess first because really this was Chris she was talking to of course he was going to be on the direct other side of the door waiting for her because he was concerned. Which means he smiled widely when he saw her and then frowned when he saw how distressed she looked and the pile of garbage she left on the floor.

“Whoa, did I miss a hurricane or something?” he asked. She slammed the door in his face. She grabbed her pile of garbage and shoved it into the nearby bin. She grabbed the only one she hadn't used and threw that one in there too. All the while Chris knocked on the door calling her name. She shoved them down into the bag before yanking it out and tying it closed. Once she had the little bathroom garbage bag ready for the dumpster and all evidence of what she had been doing in there was gone she opened the door again. Chris looked worried and a little frightened. 

“Are you okay?” he asked looking her over and then around the room.

“I'm fine,” she said, “I was a little sick and I really didn't want you to see the mess I made.”

He relaxed and smiled, “Ashley, I don't care about that. I just wanna know that you're okay.”

“Yeah, well, I am,” she said a little too quickly, “I'm gonna take this out to the dumpster before we eat dinner okay? Do you wanna set the table while I do that?”

“Yeah, sure,” he said as she walked passed him and headed for the door, “No problem.”

She had almost reached the front door when she felt Chris' arms encircle her and his hands fall right on her stomach. She freaked out feeling her anxiety rise then even though there was no possible way he could have known. He pulled her back right up against his front and held her there. His lips trailed along her neck in the way he knew she liked. She couldn't help but lean back against him and tilt her head to the side for him to have better access, relaxing into it. It always calmed her down when she was upset to be held by Chris and he knew that. He rocked her back and forth a little bit as he kissed his way up her neck and she was feeling much better until he made his way to her ear.

“Hey,” he whipsered in a voice that he probably thought was sexy, “Two more days.”

“Yep,” she said placing her free hand across his two hands in a half returning hug, her anxiety having retuned in full force at his words, “Can't wait.”

He squeezed her one last time before letting her go and heading into the kitchen. She rushed out the door. She was crying before she got it closed. She leaned against it and breathed deeply a few times to stop her tears. She had to get herself under control because Chris knew her far too well. If anything was off with her then he'd be able to tell. She started towards the dumpsters downstairs and tried not to think about what he had just said but it was all that bounced around her mind as she walked.

Two days. They were getting married in two days. 

And Chris didn't know that she was pregnant.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback always welcome.


End file.
